(Not a deal) NI Komplete Kontrol S-Series MK1 is dead

[Lionel]

9 hours ago, kitekrazy said:

Sometimes I think of getting those Arturia controllers.   They seem to be a loyal group. 

 

I’m currently invested in Arturia(and Korg).  I own the Keylab Essential 61 MKII and it’s my main controller.  Kinda irked by how soon the MKIII was released. But, no biggie.  It seems as though Arturia maintains and updates drivers for all their old products pretty well. Time will tell.

When I was looking for a new midi controller, one of the main factors was longevity(how long a company updates drivers) and an “undo” button(sounds basic, but critical for me).  I was basically looking for the RME of midi controllers.  From the little research that I did, I found that Korg, Arturia and Nektar ticked that box. If memory serves me correct, Novation too.  For reference, my Korg KONTROL49 was from the mid-2000s. It’s just amazing that Korg has maintained drivers to this day. That really makes me gravitate to their products more.

One of the things that turns me off about NI gear is that you have to fill-out a form to transfer ownership.  Not a big deal for some, but for me it is.  If you buy NI gear used/secondhand w/o transfer of ownership, everything still works… it just doesn’t show up on your NI account(for potentially discounted sw upgrade perks and free sw downloads).

Stay away from M-Audio like the plague.  I’ve purchased a few of the controllers over the years. They don’t maintain their drivers. Luckily, I’m a windows user.  So, I’m able to use old drivers on Win 10/11.

Be wary of which company you buy your next USB product from ⚠️

[antler]

I was recently looking for a MIDI controller to replace an aging IK iRig Keys (1). I ended up with an MPK mini plus: 37 mini keys, a great feature set, and a small footprint. I thought about an NI one, but it either had too few keys or was too big for the small space I have.

[Brian Lawler]

I bought my S49 MK1 just last Christmas.  It was direct from NI via their Reverb store and although it was "refurb",  it looks brand new.  I would be very P.O.'d if I paid full price for this, given that they probably had the plan in place to drop support back then.  To be honest though- It is a pretty nice keyboard vs the competition for the $175 I paid (with free shipping).  I also don't find myself using the Komplete Kontrol app very often because it is such a resource hog.  Guess they were giving the deal to blow out inventory.

[PavlovsCat]

I just want to say that I'm following along and find this thread really useful in helping decide what my next controller will be. In addition to the NEKTAR, I have an 88 key older Yamaha keyboard (I think it's the S08), an IK iRig and an old synth. I've always loved the idea of getting an NI controller because I use KONTAKT so extensively. But NI's announcement completely ruins that desire for me.  Are there any third party controllers that use their KOMPLETE KONTROL functionality or do they not license it out to other manufacturers? If they do license it out, is there a manufacturer that licensees it that is better, that is, isn't as quick to make their controllers -- or more specifically,  the drivers for their controllers-- obsolete? 

Edited October 11, 2023 by PavlovsCat

[Carl Ewing]

On 10/10/2023 at 10:40 PM, Lionel said:

This is a stark reminder NOT to invest in NI hardware if you’re in it for the long haul. Unlike other companies, NI are too lazy too maintain drivers for their HW(not to mention, they’re too lazy to maintain/update certain VSTs as well).

Anyone remember NI Kore 2??? Loved that usb device and software to control all my plugins. Just another great NI product that became a door-stopper/paperweight =/

Want to invest in a company that maintains/updates drivers for all their HW? Korg is one of my faves. I have a KONTROL49 from ages ago that works amazing. To this day, the drivers are constantly updated and the device works perfect. That’s quality.

It's not so much about laziness - it's that 100% of their resources are dedicated to the next shiny thing. They are not interested in putting resources into older products that only need support from legacy users. This is clearly viewed as 'waste of money'. They want you buying something new, not maintaining something that has limited or no revenue streams, or requires resources to make "compatible" with other product lines. And they won't really bother trying to improve sales (or improve generally) older products that have flatlined - much easier to put out a new product that is easy to sell, than trying to upgrade and re-market Absynth 6 which has dwindling users and is difficult to market.

I don't think that's a bad thing necessarily, it's just a corporate strategy where most profit is made selling an endless stream of new hyped products that follow music trends with high precision - and only supporting legacy products that are generating significant revenue and new customers. Actually, I think it is a bad strategy long term, because it forces their product line to get more and more generic and less innovative, which may negatively affect their brand name over time. But their marketing is almost second to none, so if they can keep that up they'll be fine even they're selling Komplete Garbage.

But it means customers should assume any product they're using will be quickly abandoned if it's not in that "must be generating consistent or growing revenue" high-bar threshold... or if continuing to support that product impacts their ability to evolve other newer products. For example, having legacy support for MKII synths may impact their plans for MKIII or MKIV hardware, especially if those older hardware interfaces compromise evolutions of NKS / Komplete software suite. Remember, as those synths evolve, the backend and UX change significantly, with evolving hardware specs, screen resolutions / visual complexity, which means devoting a lot of resources to make older models compatible. That's an expense budget that gets smaller every year I'm sure. If they eventually move to larger displays with touchscreen and much more demanding on-board processing you'll probably see that support window of older hardware getting smaller and smaller.

Edited October 12, 2023 by Carl Ewing

[Carl Ewing]

Oops - mistake duplicate post.

Edited October 12, 2023 by Carl Ewing

[Lionel]

6 hours ago, PavlovsCat said:

Are there any third party controllers that use their KOMPLETE KONTROL functionality… ?

Not that I’m aware of.  I think they keep that in-house.

[Lionel]

19 minutes ago, Carl Ewing said:

They are not interested in putting resources into older products that only need support from legacy users.

Someone should make a website, sticky forum post or database of all the software and hardware that companies have decided not to support anymore… maybe call it the Pro Audio Graveyard or something.  I know this kind of info can be found by googling. But this would be a nice consolidated resource to see which companies are just all about the dollar bill.  Just a thought

Would definitely help customers make more informed decisions on what products to buy and which companies to support.

[PavlovsCat]

50 minutes ago, Lionel said:

Not that I’m aware of.  I think they keep that in-house.

It's a real shame that NI operates this way (obsoleting this hardware by no longer updating drivers and not licensing out the technology to other mfrs). I now feel I would want to warn someone who was looking at NI hardware so that they understand what I just learned from this thread and everyone sharing. Thanks for this thread and comments everyone. It's the kind of stuff you don't learn from influencers who are sure to be promoting -- er, um, giving totally unbiased yet somehow highly enthusiastic "reviews" of NI's fabulous new line of controllers that never reference these practices. Ca-ching!!!

I'd rather learn from you guys. Fight the power!

Edited October 12, 2023 by PavlovsCat

[PavlovsCat]

45 minutes ago, Lionel said:

Someone should make a website, sticky forum post or database of all the software and hardware that companies have decided not to support anymore… maybe call it the Pro Audio Graveyard or something.  I know this kind of info can be found by googling. But this would be a nice consolidated resource to see which companies are just all about the dollar bill.  Just a thought

Would definitely help customers make more informed decisions on what products to buy and which companies to support.

I actually think that's a great idea. Okay, I don't immediately see how you'd make money off of it to pay for its upkeep, but I think the idea is pretty cool and even love the name -- and I've used the profoundly poorly named site called KnobCloud to buy used software -- that just doesn't sound good and I still want to erase it from my browser history.  They should have called you for name ideas!   PM me when you launch Pro Audio Graveyard! Maybe you can do it before Halloween for a cool tie-in. 

Edited October 12, 2023 by PavlovsCat

[Lionel]

1 hour ago, PavlovsCat said:

I actually think that's a great idea. Okay, I don't immediately see how you'd make money off of it to pay for its upkeep, but I think the idea is pretty cool and even love the name -- and I've used the profoundly poorly named site called KnobCloud to buy used software -- that just doesn't sound good and I still want to erase it from my browser history.  They should have called you for name ideas!   PM me when you launch Pro Audio Graveyard! Maybe you can do it before Halloween for a cool tie-in. 

For sure!  I could put something together.  And hopefully I could get a lot of input from everyone. 

I'll DM you